Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Oh my goodness, I had such a wonderful birthday this year! Brandon really outdid himself and made me feel so special!

I woke up to breakfast in bed. Waffles, bacon, eggs, orange juice, and donut holes. Out in the kitchen there were two dozen roses and Happy Birthday signs and balloons.

Mckinley showed me where my presents were hidden (same spot every year). Brandon got me exactly what I asked for and more.

Mckinley was just so excited all day long that it was my birthday. You can't help but have a good day with her around. Here we are wearing the matching shirts my sister made us. And Mckinley is sporting her new glasses that she got the night before my birthday. They are so cute!!

My mission companion Liz came and brought me flowers and spent the morning with me. It was so much fun visiting with her.

I went and picked up Brandon for lunch and we went and got sandwiches and ate them in the car while our children slept.

We ate dinner at home and then all went out for ice cream and picked up some popcorn to come home and watch a movie.

Birthday candles in a banana split.

And my parents came by to bring me a present. Seriously, it was such a wonderful day. I am so grateful to my family who shows me how much they love me even though most of the time I don't deserve it.

Sunday, April 20, 2014

Happy Easter!!! Easter is totally Mckinley's favorite holiday. I love that about her. She was so excited for it to come this year. We had a pretty sweet paper chain going for Easter. I should have taken a picture of it. Anyway, we had such a wonderful Easter.

I am in love with this picture. Tyler and Kallie are holding hands all on their own. Heart: melted.

Love these kids of mine.

Vineyard city Easter egg hunt. Wasn't as good as we heard last year's was, but still a lot of fun for the kids.

Thursday, April 10, 2014

I know Brandon hates these marathon posts (sorry Bran) but it's all I can do right now. I don't find time to blog more often than this and so when I finally get on, there are just a lot of pictures I can't resist posting. I love love love looking back on my blog and that is the main reason I still do it, so anyway, if this post is too long for you, feel free to skip it.

Tyler and Kallie painting.

Tyler isn't super into wearing big shoes, but when he does, he usually chooses Dad's shoes. This kid is all boy! I love that he is walking around in them backwards here.

Just a super cute picture of these guys the first day they wore summer clothes this year.

Someone remind me about how easy pipe cleaners are for crazy hair day when Mckinley is old enough for that in school. She loved this!!

We've made a few trips to Macey's for ice cream cones lately and the kids love it! After we bought the smallest size for Tyler and Kallie we saw someone else come and get a tiny baby kiddie cone for their kid that would have been perfect for them! Next time...

This was the same day as the pipe cleaner hair and Mckinley loved wearing her pipe cleaner ring. :) This girl is so easy to please and has such a wonderful imagination.

I love Kallie's bath time Mohawk.

I took Kallie and Mckinley to a neighbor's birthday party one day and Brandon took Tyler to the spring practice football thingo at BYU.

I just love this picture!!!

So, this is the second time this happened! Earlier in the year at a family baby blessing Shellee and I had accidentally dressed our girls the exact same and then at another family baby blessing a few months later, it happened again. Totally random and crazy.

So excited about popcorn popping in the hallway.

These guys are so cute when we start saying family prayers. Of course this lasts all of two seconds and then they are running around the room the rest of the prayer.

I couldn't get him to kneel for the picture.

Had to document this. Kallie's latest thing is pulling the vents out and walking around with them. It drives us nuts!

Ha ha, I love when she squeezes her own cheeks.

Mckinley's thing lately is to draw pictures, cut them out, and then tape them on the windows or wall or even on herself. She is in full Easter mode these days and was drawing Easter eggs and other things for Easter.

Mckinley still wants to wear a skirt every day so I usually let her until we need to go somewhere. I told her to go put on pants. A few seconds later I was watching her walk around in these capris wondering what they were because she doesn't have any capris. Then I realized they were Kallie's jeans. She thought they were her shorts. I can't believe she squeezed into 18 month clothes! And didn't realize it.

Kristen has been helping me split the twins up and it has been wonderful. Sadly, they both do really well without each other. This was on a day when she had Tyler and it was just the girls hanging out together. We have been loving going to the park on warm days.

Kallie and Tyler both go down the tallest slides all on their own which is so surprising to me because Mckinley was not that way at all.

I sure hope these two grow up to be best friends!

I love this picture. Mckinley wears her dance shoes backpack on dance days for like an hour before we even leave. And of course she has to get as much coloring in as possible. She looks so cute just sitting at her desk.

This was from today. We went to the park by Heidi's house and said hello to the horses.

Tyler tickling Kallie's feet before bedtime. He is really into tickling everyone right now and makes the cutest tickle tickle tickle noise when he does it.

Tyler and Kallie are starting to talk! They really are growing up so fast and we keep thinking we should stop calling them "the babies" but old habits die hard. We can't seem to stop. Anyway, for some awesome videos of them talking, click here and here.

I really don't like getting old. Most of the time I still feel like I'm a little kid and I'm just playing pretend taking care of babies and living in my very own house, but when I really think about how old I am, I don't like it.

Ten years ago I was in the Philippines serving a mission. We haven't had a mission reunion for five years. One of the AP's from when I was there put together a reunion this year with catered Filipino food and everything. It was great. I didn't take very many pictures while I was there but I had a great time seeing everyone and I was so glad Brandon came with me!

Me and Camile.

With the Hopkins.

With the Biddulph's. I really had the best mission president in the world!!!